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albania keeps me smiling

A bit over four months on the bike I have lived over my budget and spent more times couch surfing and with friends than in the tent. Maybe is has not quite been the hardcore adventure that I had expected yet but it is still Europe and I realized how much I like to meet people from different cultures. And as I see it, I will have plenty of time to spend in my tent, better to enjoy the company while possible!

I do miss home ocationally and I really miss my friends always but on the whole I really do love this life, it makes sense to. I gain energy from all the brilliant people I met and I hope to bring that along all the way!

My bike is starting to show signs of wear, the gears do not work all that well anymore, putting too much force on 4-5-6 really makes the chain jump around and it is probably time to change the casset sometime soon. I found a place where I cound mend the bags that have ripped from the wear (already!). I stayed around to see the guy working.

mending

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I thought, and it still probably is possible, that I could go around Europe on 200€ a month. This month my expenses ran up to 4268 SEK, some 400€. This is disappointing, I though I would be able to do this with out a problem. naive?

Here in France food is quite expensive, and i hav tended to eat bread and cheese for lunch since this is faster and does not leave you with a dirty gas kitchen to drag around. The fact is, a bread costs around 2-3€ if you are not getting the “white devil”, the baguette, which after a while will make your stomach halt completly. Then the cheese. I tend to lean over the brie and the emmenthal and reach for the stuff with a bit more taste, read: more expensive, goat cheese. But I realized that with the amount I need to eat and the fact that I dont have loads of time to shop since I leave the bike outside the store alone tends to ruin my budget. I go for the safe things I know and it is still alot cheaper than eating out.

How ever, I need make a plan. This does not hold and even though I wont be in Europe that much longer I need this money to pay for the visas, right now i’m half a years budget on the negative side an i need to do some serious saving the coming months. Now in Italy, arrived yesterday, things are alot cheaper than in France. I think here i can get away with the 6€ a day, i will really try to get there, it will probably be a lot of cooking on the stove from now on, the cheese is just not in my budget range, I was up in the clouds thinking that.

so, this trip so far has cost me 11144SEK, some 1000€, but that includes inoculations, medications and things for the bike. this is about what I should have been using for the first half of the year and now I will move over to a diet of rice, beans, nuts and salt. I hope this will be the formula to reduce my outtakes.

Dark day from an economic perspective but I really enjoy the ride. I got loads of interesting plans here in Italy and I will head south to Roma to join in a “critical mass” in the end of May. My whole schedule is a bit shifted and I’m working now in the continuation, how will i move on from here?

The last days in France was very nice, I followed a Couch Surfer Friend to Montpellier, and got to meet some really good people see a brilliant place, a small hamlet, not far from Montpellier.

looking out over the hills, outside montpellier

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arrived

The first month has passed with the many weather conditions and all new experiences though economicly it was a disaster. I had the many inoculations on my todo list and getting all the medications proved fatal for my budget. I’m almost ashamed to admit I spent 3302 SEK or some 330 euros the first month on food, much due to the fact I was just so cold I felt I needed the hot food and the warm inside to heat up. I spent 3565 SEK on inoculations, medications and things for the bike.

This sums up to 6867 SEK for the first month, puh, Pas très bien, though now I have a challange, i really need to keep this down to meet the budget i have been given. On the other hand, I did some 1940 kilometers this first month, in contrast of the 1500 I had planned using the “50 km a day” scheme.

This month, the first three days of april I have kept the costs down to a minimum. Though, it is not easy here in France where the fresh pain au chocolate are tempting my taste buds constantly, litterly screaming out their need to be eaten. Puh!

from now on

The trip from Enschede in the Netherlands via Oss, had some really bright moments. I was served the most wonderful dinner in Oss and I stayed with a fellow biker in Leuven in Belgium. Belgium as well as the Netherlands are brilliant for biking with lanes, sign and helpful people. Socially as well as weatherwise this leg was brilliant, though, I start to long for the desserts and the mountains out east, for the ruff and rugged.

Tomorrow I head south, towards Paris and i hope to enter the city from the East on sunday afternoon. It is said to be a bit difficult to bike into Paris so i have done some research and got myself a good map to carry along, hope for the best.

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